In 2011-12 security forces used tanks, gunfire and mass arrests to try to crush anti-government street protests inspired by the Arab Spring in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. The protests rapidly took on a more formal nature when the opposition began to organise political and military wings for a long uprising against the Baath government. As 2012 wore on, the stand-off escalated into civil war, with defections from the governing elite signalling the steady collapse of central authority.